For the 20th anniversary of World of Warcraft, former Blizzard developer Rob Pardo recalled a humorous anecdote from the early days of the MMORPG.
What is that anecdote? In an interview about the 20th anniversary of World of Warcraft, Rob Pardo explained that the MMORPG had far fewer quests during its development phase than in the launch version.
According to the veteran developer, it was the feedback from playtesters that prompted the team to deliver ten times as many quests as planned to satisfy the beta players. They started running out of tasks at a certain point, which made the game “feel broken”.
The solution for the developers was simply to design more quests. While this was extremely labor-intensive, they also aimed to be significantly more accessible and beginner-friendly than the major competitor EverQuest. Quests that lead players to the maximum level were meant to support exactly that.
And the plan succeeded! WoW was considered the most beginner-friendly and accessible MMORPG on the market at launch. Just one reason among many for the enormous success. The large number of quests made available through tester feedback for the Vanilla version of WoW formed the foundation for the more than 38,000 quests currently available in World of Warcraft.
In 20 years of WoW, there have been many highlights:
When players build the MMORPG of their dreams
Who is Rob Pardo? The veteran developer worked at Blizzard from October 1997 (!) to July 2014 and was able to contribute as lead developer to a variety of games, such as World of Warcraft, Warcraft 3, StarCraft, Diablo 2, and Diablo 3. He also held the roles of Chief Creative Officer and Executive Vice President of Game Design.
After leaving Blizzard, Rob Pardo founded Bonfire Studios, which aims to focus on online games for PC and has managed to secure Riot Games as a financial partner. However, in the seven years the studio has existed, it has neither released a game nor announced one.
Why look at EverQuest? While there were quite a few games in the era of the first 3D MMORPGs from which to draw inspiration, the first EverQuest offered the best overall package to date, with a massive game world, 14 classes, twelve races, guilds, and much more. In October 2002, the first raid in MMORPG history followed.
There were two additional points. On the one hand, Blizzard knew that the EverQuest team was already developing a sequel that was supposed to release shortly before World of Warcraft. On the other hand, there were some genre enthusiasts in the WoW team who had played EverQuest ambitiously with their guilds – among them were Jeff Kaplan and Rob Pardo.
It’s clear that the two designers had specific ideas about what their MMORPG should do better or differently based on their experiences with EverQuest. If you’re looking for more anecdotes from two decades of WoW, check out MeinMMO demon Cortyn’s anniversary special: 20 years of World of Warcraft – It’s more than just a game
